|
From the beginning, SNK has tried to spruce up 2D fighters by incorporating elements of three-dimensionality. With 1991's Fatal Fury, SNK introduced the idea of multi-planar fighting, where the characters may step along a Z axis, into or out of the screen. The King of Fighters '94 adapted the idea of a sidestep for a single plane: press two buttons, and dodge into the background for a moment, to avoid being hit. SNK already had the technique down, that was not rediscovered until five years later, in Sega's Virtua Fighter 3.
All of that I see now, in retrospect.
In a sense it is, then, curious that SNK has experimented so little with true 3D design. On a gameplay level, SNK's development staff has been ready for thirteen years. Yet so far, SNK's few attempts to branch out of its increasingly-dedicated niche have all been cursed by miscalculation or fate or some other factor.
Perhaps it is all a backlash for reaching so far with the company's first system, the NeoGeo MVS, rather than playing along with the crowd. Having severed all ties to a normal existance in return for becoming the master and champion of 2D games, the market shifted under SNK. By the mid-'90s, when SNK had perfected its craft, traditional 2D design had become passe under the weight of the trendy 3D. SNK was trapped by its own once-menacing technology.
In 1998, when it had become clear that 3D was no fad, SNK seemed to panic. The company released the Hyper NeoGeo 64 -- an underpowered 3D arcade board with only a half-dozen titles, only two or three of which are considered tolerable -- in a rushed attempt to catch up to a market which seemed to be escaping the company. Either here or back on the MVS, SNK reformulated its major 2D series, giving them a stylistic overhaul, new and gimmicky game systems, and attractive new lead characters. When the Hyper NeoGeo 64 went bust, SNK turned to Sega for support. For the next couple of years, SNK experimented with the Dreamcast console, adding 3D backgrounds to their home ports of KoF'98 and '99, and designing an original music game, 2000's Cool Cool Toon, for the system.
SNK never got a chance to follow that thread very far, however, before then-parent company Aruze forced SNK into bankrupcy, then shut the company down and shattered it for the spare parts.
With its new life, SNK Playmore -- the revived SNK, reforged from the splinters of the original company -- seems refocused; organized in a way that the original company never was. Having survived death and disgrace, the company has become SNK the White, as it were. It knows what it has to do.
One of those things that SNK has to do, is to reach out to a mass audience which has eluded the company for so long, while remaining true to the heart of SNK: to show everybody else what SNK's hardcore fans have found so special, for so long. To do that means escaping the burden of the NeoGeo, and it means tackling 3D again. To do any of that means time, manpower, and money. To get any of that means organization, persistance, and humility.
Since 2002, Playmore -- later SNK Playmore -- has been building, step-by-step. SNK is now organized better than the old SNK ever was. From nothing, up through bigger and bigger jobs, SNK has been gathering the money and carefully investing it in future projects. Only months ago, SNK announced the retirement of the NeoGeo, in favor of the familiar Dreamcast-based Atomiswave platform. And now, here is the first 3D fighter of SNK's new age.
As with the Nintendo DS or the Gamecube controller, KOF: Maximum Impact is something that I just failed to understand until I put my hands on it. Although the new SNK keeps surprising me, this project made me nervous. Although I am encouraged by almost every move SNK has chosen in the last two years, the shift from 2D to 3D design is a difficult and fickle one; it took most developers the better part of a hardware generation to sort out the problems -- and even a decade later, some still don't get it. For someone as still-fragile as SNK, and with so little experience, the idea seemed as dangerous to me as it ultimately is necessary. While even a marginal success would give SNK a toehold as a major developer again, an expensive flop would, at best, make the company an object of continued ridicule.
I did not expect a revolution. I just wanted the game not to suck.
Maximum Impact does, in no way, suck. While it is no Virtua Fighter 4: Evolution (and what is?), this is a damned good game. If it had been released for the Dreamcast (which, let's face it, still holds its own against most fare on the current systems), it would be considered a respectable contender against Dead or Alive 2 and Soul Calibur. I, for one, sure enjoy it more than the former game.
This is an observant game; wary, yet confident. SNK and Noise have been watching. They have seen what works, and what does not.
The best way I can describe Maximum Impact is the gameplay of KOF, edited for even closer combat and mixed with the best parts of the two Dreamcast games above. More than any other game I have played -- and certainly more than the Street Fighter EX games -- this seems to be an example of a successful fusion of 2D and 3D fighter mechanics. You have the traditional planar moves; the quarter-circles and the half-circles, and the jumps and the ducks and the dashes. Then you have sidesteps and rolling and free-roaming and walled stages, as well as some new Soul Calibur-style tap-tap moves.
I have heard a few people criticize MI for how little seems to have changed from the original 2D games, implying that the change is insignificant. To me, with how effortless, and almost obvious, the game feels, MI seems to hint that a true Z-axis is perhaps the one key ingredient which The King of Fighters has been missing all along. SNK has been implying the third dimension since before the beginning. Now that it is here for real, the change is subtle more because it fills an intangible gap, than because of any flaw in concept or execution. From a certain perspective, this looks like the game that SNK has wanted to make for a long, long time.
The change is less Mario 64; more Ocarina of Time. Where Mario had to be reinvented for a 3D environment, and never really reconstructed the appeal of the original games, all you have to do with Zelda to make it 3D is to rotate the Y axis. The rest is built-in. The same goes here. The King of Fighters works in 3D because the dimension already is there; all you have to do is acknowledge it and use it. Any adjustments are not so much changes are they are additions and corrections, to take advantage of the extra space.
The E3 demo contains thirteen playable characters: Kyo Kusanai, Iori Yagami, Terry Bogard, Ryo Sakazaki, Yuri Sakazaki, Ralf Jones, K', Maxima, Seth, and new characters Alba Meira, Soiree Meira, Mignon Beart (this seems to be her final name; the spelling keeps changing), and Chae Lim -- basically an exact clone of Kim Kaphwan, only female. (Come to think of it, she looks a little like May Lee.) Other characters revealed, although unplayable in the demo, include Mai Shiranui, Rock Howard, Athena Asamiya, Leona Heidern, Clark Steel, and new character Lien Neville. Taking a cue from other 3D fighters, each character has two distinct costumes. Taking a cue from 2D fighters, each costume has two different colors. Taking a cue from SNK's fans, the alternate costumes are generally just what you might expect and demand. Ryo's second costume is the "old Ryo" from Buriki-One. Both traditional and Mark of the Wolves Terry are present. Both the Orochi and the NESTS-era Kyo are available. Ralf's second costume is his outfit from Ikari Warriors. In his second outfit, K' is made out like his counterpart Krizalid, from KoF'99. Iori and Yuri finally get new outfits: he, with snakeskin pants and a loose, open shirt that exposes his chest; she, with a nifty army getup. Seth is pimped out in a way that Falcoon would appreciate. Maxima just looks angry. The second costumes for the new characters tend to be similarly whimsical; Mignon, for instance, has a cat suit.
Unlike the main KOF series, yet like its predecessor Fatal Fury, matches in MI are traditional one-on-one, best-of-three affairs. The controls are the same as always: four buttons -- two kicks; two punches. Jump, duck, run. Hold forward or backward and press both light punch and light kick, to roll in that direction. Most of the characters' moves are the same. A few are different -- although even that is a familiar rule in KOF, from year to year. Rather than either her familiar spin kick or her run-forward-and-slap-the-opponent silly move, Yuri has a kick move similar to Terry's Crack Shoot, only with a follow-up blow -- very useful in close combat. Most of the changes are along these lines; as with the makeover in KoF'96, they serve to push the opponents closer together. Many line attacks do remain, however -- if for no other purpose than to glorify the strategic use of the sidestep.
To sidestep up, you merely press the two light attack buttons, with no joystick motion. To step down, you hold down and press the buttons. From that position, you may punch your opponent in the side of his or her face. It is simple enough to make one wonder why none of the characters ever thought of doing it before. Or at least, when they did sidestep (as in '96-'98), why they did little but shift to the side and then stumble right back into the line of fire. In retrospect, it seems almost as silly as the way, after a back-dash in '99, characters would instantly bounce forward again, into the opponent's fist. You can also hold R1, for a free walk -- as in Soul Calibur. Also as in that game, several characters seem to have gained new, easy button-combo moves. Press, say, light kick and light punch, in rapid succession, to execute a useful little attack or combo. When you are knocked down, you may roll to the right or left to avoid being pummeled on the ground, or you may flip back up.
The control is crisp and responsive, even with the Dual Shock 2 controller. Moves came out when I wanted them, and never when I did not. Characters like K' control more easily than ever, with a lot of leeway for multi-part attacks. Collision and hitboxes seem to have received a lot of attention; never did I feel like I should not have been hit when I was, or that I missed the opponent when I should have connected. The overall impression that both Tim and I received is one of unusual cleanliness. Aside from a few little bugs, such as one that Brandon reported where on one occasion he somehow caused his character to hover off the ground, at head-level (a feat he was unable to replicate), and Yuri's unblockable fireball, there is little to comment on here other than how comfortable the game feels. It is accessible and friendly to the touch, yet one always has a sense of total control. There is no button-mashing here.
The fighting is fast and energetic. It feels like there may be a speed throttle in the options, as the game seems a bit accelerated -- albeit in organic enough a way. It's just, I have never seen a Burn Wave move this quickly. Some attacks seem to come out as quickly as you can hit the button.
I am as impressed with the presentation as I am with the game itself. Before a match, the opponents will go through their poses and introductions as the camera cuts and swoops around. As it zooms in, and the announcer gets ready to begin the match, the players may freely position their characters -- run, jump, dash, sidestep; anything but attack. During a Desperation Move, the camera will zoom and rotate a bit, to find a dramatic angle, then will right itself before normal gameplay resumes. It is not intrusive, and it looks kind of neat. The character models, though not top-of-the-line, are more attractive than I expected -- and more handsome than they appear in the early screenshots. Mouths open, breasts bounce, muscles flex, cloth billows. Again, it is about of the level of Dead or Alive 2. The characters animate surprisingly well; just watch how Iori slinks forward and back, in real life (as it were). I also find it interesting to be able to see the backs of several characters; characters now all have two stances -- right and left. The stages are flat, yet varied and interesting enough. Cars bounce when you get thrown into them. Chain-link fences rattle. It all works, and looks nice. The only problem is that it can be easy to get trapped against a wall -- yet this is par for the course. When the round is over, you are allowed to continue molesting your opponent until the announcer is done pontificating. When the match is over, the camera dynamically zooms in on your character as he or she unleashes the trademark SNK scorn. Somehow taunts have a lot more impact when you can look into a character's eyes.
It looks like, with this game, SNK is putting in an effort to re-establish the familiar characters and settings. Aside from the multiple character versions that I mentioned earlier, each character seems to be tied to a specific stage again. Ralf hangs out amongst the shipping containers by the docks. Ryo practices in an old church. Maxima meets you in a parking lot. Mignon has a dance club. In story mode (itself a promising name), each battle is preceded by a series of introductions. First you get the stage intro, where your opponent comes forward to meet you. Ralf, who has been lying on a container, springs up, calls to your character, jumps down to the playfield, and struts forward. Next, while the game loads, you get the versus screen. While you read the opponent's full name ("Ryo Sakazaki", compared to just "Ryo"), and a short quote, the opponent says something to you. After this comes the standard character intros and the start of the match. The full character names remain printed at the top of the screen.
As SNK seems fond of doing, MI seems to both sample from and to not quite sit within the established SNK storylines. It contains characters from various KOF eras, on top of the sometimes-radical alternate costumes. Ikari Warriors-era Ralf might fight Mark of the Wolves-era Terry or even Rock. Not the tyke from KoF'01, but the fully-grown teenager we first met. K', Maxima, and Seth appear for no reason which can be related to the normal KOF story -- especially given that the official plot of MI revolves around a small-scale gang war in Southtown. They are there because this is a new envisioning of the King of Fighters tournament, to go with a new envisioning of the game. Fair enough.
If you recall the music in the early trailers for the game, the in-game music is all of the same quality; dark, up-tempo beats and swirling, erratic synth. It's good stuff, and better than we have heard from KOF in a while. Along with the lighting and art design, it helps to create a solid, rather intense atmosphere for the game.
There is virtually no AI in the E3 demo; opponents tend to just stand around and punch every now and then. Also, it is impossible for a second player to break in during story mode -- although this could be to allow showgoers to test out the mode without interruption.
I have spent several hours with the game at this point, and I believe this is probably both the most ambitious and the most successful project SNK has undertaken since the NeoGeo itself. That it is competent, and playable, is impressive enough. That it is actually a good, well-considered, energetic, fun game on its own right -- even in its current, incomplete stage -- is a revelation. To some players unfamiliar with SNK or with 2D games in general, the sheer personality of MI, combined with the familiar KOF gameplay, should fire off a few mental rockets, and bring more attention to the main 2D series.
As it is, Maximum Impact might not be the most innovative fighter ever -- yet damn, is it a solid start. SNK did everything right; they seem to have missed all of the obvious blunders, and have even gone a step further to accomplish a few minor feats of their own. The game's heart is in the right place; it understands what it is and where it comes from. There is nothing rash or confused here. SNK and Noise have shown that they know what they're doing, and that they have the skill to do it.
More to come in a couple of months, when the next demo is available.
Eric-Jon Rössel Waugh
thinks he's a clone now.
|
